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10 October 2011

Menu Plan Monday for October 10th.

Is it just me?  It seems like our money just isn't stretching as far as it used to.  Between increased gas, utilities and grocery prices, it seems like everywhere I turn I'm spending more. 

Ronnie and I have decided to re-read Dave Ramsey's Total Money Makeover and come up with a better budget.  It was really easy for us to stay on track when we were working towards paying off our credit card debt five years ago.  It seems like once that was done, we have slowly added a little here and a little there to our budget without knowing it. 

One of the things I have continued to do is to keep up with our menu plan.  I post it here to keep myself accountable.  I'm so proud of us.  We haven't eaten out at a restaurant for over five weeks.  The only thing we've done is pick up a pizza from Colo's when I was at the Dr. late with the boys when they were sick.  Planning our menu really helps us to not waste our money eating out. 

So here's what's on the plan for this week:

Monday:  Grilled honey garlic shrimp, rice and salad
Tuesday:  Chili with cornbread muffins
Wednesday: Honey grilled chicken, cheesy cauliflower pancakes and baked potatoes
Thursday:  Baked potato soup and Bread machine oatmeal bread
Friday:  Taco salads (with leftover chili)
Saturday:  Baked spaghetti, green beans and garlic bread.  Ice cream cake for dessert. 
Sunday:  Leftovers or breakfast for dinner

Saturday is Josiah's birthday.  How can he be four years old already?  I was planning on just buying pizza for his dinner, but he asked for my "cheesy spaghetti" instead.  Hopefully, I can put it together before soccer and bake it when we get home.  He also wants ice cream cake instead of a regular cake.  At least he didn't ask for Coco Wheat this year.

Here's to a great week!

3 comments:

daltonxa said...

I'm doing chili and taco salad this week too! Menu planning has helped us not eat out as much either. I can't say that we've done as well as you but we are down to about once a week. What does that say about how often it was before?! I've also started buying a few processed meals to have on hand like frozen pizza and Stouffer's lasagna so we don't eat out when I don't feel like cooking. Its still cheaper and healthier than going out. Now that Aaliyah is getting older and I'm starting to feel more like myself I'm hoping to cut out the eating out even more!

Erica said...

Jeremy must not have logged out of his gmail account. That was not Jeremy posting as I'm sure you've figured out. :)

Charli said...

Erica, I agree. I've been picking up some "freezer meals" like lasagna for the same reason. It costs more than making it myself, but I'm being realistic. It's a lot cheaper than going out to eat. And don't feel bad. We used to eat out 2-3 times a week! Crazy, huh? That's why 5 weeks is incredible for us.